Characters Read the books fanfiction
by Lissie529
Summary: The characters from directly after the House of Hades, are sent back in time to the gods. They are sent to read the books, starting from the Lightning Thief to the Blood of Olympus. Adding more characters later. Rated T 'cause I'm paranoid...
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1**

**Olympus of the Past**

The gods were arguing over the usual things. Demeter and Hades were fighting over Persephone. Aphrodite was lecturing Artemis about love. Zeus and Poseidon were arguing over whether sky or sea was better. Suddenly, a flash of white light was in the middle of the room. A group of people were standing, dazed.

"Who are you?" Zeus called out to the group. A beautiful girl short, choppy hair and kaleidoscope eyes stepped forwards. "I am Piper McLean, daughter of Aphrodite." Aphrodite squealed. "Honey, you look so grown up! Maybe I should give you a make-"

"No thanks, Mom." She said. A scrawny boy with curly hair and a gold tool belt said, "I'm Leo Valdez, son of Hephaestus." Hephaestus looked proud, but said nothing.

Next up, a boy with brown eyes who looked very athletic came up and said, "Frank Zhang, Praetor of the Twelfth Legion, son of Mars." Ares, on his throne, flickered in between his usual form and a Roman toga, and then went back to himself looking like he had a headache.

A blonde girl with gray eyes stepped up, and Athena raised an eyebrow. "I am Annabeth Chase, daughter of Athena." Athena said, "This is you? But you are only a small child."

A letter unfolded in front of Athena, as well as ten books. "This is a letter," she said. She read,  
_To the gods,  
You might not recognize them, but these are your children, grown up. They've come here to talk about the past, which you shall read about. These ten books are for you all to read. No killing them, this goes to you, Zeus and Hades. No killing any of the characters, either.  
From, Slayer of the Mighty Python and God of Haikus, Apollo._

"Well," said Hades, who was here for the Winter Solstice. "Let the others introduce themselves." A curly cinnamon-haired girl stepped up next to Frank. "Hazel Levesque, daughter of-" she hesitated, "…Pluto." She nearly whispered. Lightning struck the temple outside. Zeus and Poseidon stood up.

"YOU BROKE THE OATH!" They both yelled in unison. "YOU BROKE YOUR WORD ON THE STYX!" A dark-haired boy with sea-green eyes raised a hand and cleared his throat. "Ahem, I would like to say something."

"What do you want to say, boy?!" Zeus nearly yelled. The boy had no fear on his face whatsoever. "Percy Jackson, Praetor of the Twelfth Legion, Savior of Olympus, and…" he had a grin on his face, and made suspense, "…Son of Poseidon." At this, Zeus nearly had steam coming out of his ears. Then, a blonde boy with electric blue eyes walked up, maybe to stop the tension. "Hey, over here." He waved his hands. "Jason Grace, Son of Zeus." Athena stood up, raising a hand to stop them all. "You should all stop arguing. You have all broken your sacred oath because you could not help yourselves. Just let us finish these books quickly." Of course, they had to listen to the Goddess of Wisdom.

Annabeth looked proud. "Okay, which one is the first one?"

Zeus looked at the books. "Uh, the first is…" His eyes almost bulged out his head. "The Lightning Thief."

Percy said quickly, "I'll read first." He took the book from Athena's hands.

**So, what do you think? I'm new, so please leave comments for tips.**


	2. Exploding Demons

**I Accidently Vaporize My Pre-Algebra Teacher**

"How do you _accidently _do that?" Hazel wondered.  
"I would've done it too, Hazel," Leo said. "Unfortunately, I had no weapons in middle school."****

Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood.

"Neither did we," said every demigod present.  
**  
If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is: close this book right now. Believe what-ever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life.**

Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways.

Everyone winced, remembering someone who had died in a nasty, painful way.  
**  
If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened.**

But if you recognize yourself in these pages-if you feel something stirring inside-stop reading immediately.

"Close the book!" said Leo from the back. Piper whacked him upside the head.  
**  
You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before they sense it too, and they'll come for you.**

Don't say I didn't warn you.

My name is Percy Jackson.

"Great, this is from my point of view," Percy groaned. Annabeth snickered. "So know we'll know what's going on in your thoughts, if it's not full of seaweed."  
**  
I'm twelve years old. Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school. Am I a troubled kid?**

"Yes," said everyone.  
**  
Yeah. You could say that.**

"Even he admits it!" There was another flash of white light. Three people stood before them. Well, more like two people standing and one on their face. They burst into laughter. The satyr on the floor, who was blushing, stood up. "Grover Underwood, Lord of the Wild, satyr and protector." Percy stood and gave him a high-five. "Hey, G-Man," he said. "Nice to see you." A girl who had a punk style and a bow and arrow stepped forward, and Artemis beamed. "Thalia Grace, Lieutenant of Artemis, daughter of Zeus." "You broke the-" Athena gave Poseidon the death glare, and he was quiet. Another girl said, "Clarisse La Rue, drakon slayer, daughter of Ares." Ares looked surprised. "I had a daughter?" A emo-looking kid, who seemed to appear from the shadows (which he did) walked to the middle of the throne room. "Nico di Angelo, Ambassador of Pluto, son of Hades." Hades flickered in-between his two forms, Poseidon looking proud. He was the only one who hadn't broken the oath twice. Athena kept reading.  
**  
I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan- twenty-eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.**

"That sounds fascinating. Mom, take me there?" Annabeth asked. Athena nodded silently.****

I know-it sounds like torture.

Everyone burst into laughter.

**Most Yancy field trips were.**

But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.

Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep.

I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble.

"That's going to be hard," Thalia muttered.****

Boy, was I wrong.

See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course I got expelled anyway.

Ares said, "Maybe this kid isn't that bad!"

**And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind- the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an unplanned swim. And the time before that... Well, you get the idea.**

"Aw, I wanted to hear more."  
**  
This trip, I was determined to be good.**

All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, hitting my best friend Grover in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.

"Who eats peanut butter and ketchup?" Piper asked.  
**  
Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back several grades, because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled.**

Hephaestus coughed. "Sorry, Lord Hephaestus." Percy apologized. Grover said, "Generous description, Percy."

**He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.**

Everyone laughed again. "Way to blow your cover, goat boy!" Thalia laughed.  
**  
Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened me with death-**

"WHAT!" Poseidon bellowed.

** by in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.**

"See, no need to worry, Dad," Percy said.****

"I'm going to kill her," I mumbled.

Clarisse whooped. Ares said, "Please do. This is getting _awfully _boring for my taste, boy."  
**  
Grover tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter. "**

He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch.

"That's it." I started to get up, but Grover pulled me back to my seat.

Groans from guess who.  
**  
"You're already on probation," he reminded me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens. "**

Looking back on it, I wish I'd decked Nancy Bobofit right then and there. In-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into.

Mr. Brunner led the museum tour.

He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.

It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.

"Bit more than that, son," Poseidon said.  
**  
He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx-**

"Sphinxes don't come with good memories," Annabeth said. Grover, Percy, and her shivered, remembering the Labyrinth.

** On the top, and started telling us how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye.**

Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker.

Cue Ares grinning proudly, you guess why.

**She had come to Yancy halfway through the year, when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.**

"Is that…" Hades said, but stopped. _A Fury,_ he thought.  
**  
From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured I was devil's spawn.**

"Nope, that's him right here," Thalia pointed a finger to Nico. Nico pouted.

**She would point her crooked finger at me and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month.**

One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told Grover I didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, real serious, and said, "You're absolutely right."

The gods groaned. "You're not supposed to tell him that!"****

Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art.

Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and said, "Will you shut up?"

It came out louder than I meant it to.  
  
"Ooooh," said someone. Needless to say, they got hit by a wave.  
**  
The whole group laughed. Mr. Brunner stopped his story.**

"Mr. Jackson," he said, "did you have a comment?"

My face was totally red. I said, "No, sir."

Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"

I looked at the carving, and felt a flush of relief, because I actually recognized it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"

"No need to remind us," Zeus said.  
**  
"Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because ... "**

"Well..." I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god, and-"

"GOD!" Zeus bellowed. "Get your FACTS STRAIGHT, BOY!"  
Percy looked like he was trying to be calm. "Zeus, I was only _twelve. _After-" he wavered. "After what's going to happen which I am not going to tell you because it's a spoiler, I understand now."  
Zeus harrumphed and sat back down.  
**  
"God?" Mr. Brunner asked.**

"Titan," I corrected myself.

"Yes, Seaweed Brain," Annabeth pushed him playfully.

**"And ... He didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters-"**

"Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me.

"-and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans, " I continued, "and the gods won."

Some snickers from the group.

Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids. '"

"And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"

"Busted," Frank muttered.****

"Busted," Grover muttered.

Everyone snickered.  
**  
"Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.**

At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.

"Why do you keep calling him 'Mr. Brunner'?" Jason asked. "I thought he was Chi-" Piper covered his mouth at the last part, so he said, "Chi-ruhmgf." Piper smiled and waved for Percy to read on.  
**  
I thought about his question, and shrugged. "I don't know, sir."**

"I see." Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach.

Hazel and Piper gagged.

**The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"**

The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses.  
  
"Boys always act like doofuses," Thalia said. Artemis had nothing to comment about that, as she agreed on it. ****

Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."

I knew that was coming.

I told Grover to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"

Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go- intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything.

"Three thousand," Annabeth coughed into her hand. She couldn't help correcting him.  
**  
"You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner told me.**

"About the Titans?"

"About real life. And how your studies apply to it. "

"Everyone present knows why, right?" Frank said. Everyone nodded, otherwise they probably wouldn't be alive.  
**  
"Oh."**

"What you learn from me," he said, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson. "

I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.  
  
Jason stood up and said, "Nothing much is happening. Is there any way we can leave?" Artemis shrugged. "You can try, but my annoying twin might have done something." Jason walked through the door. He came back in through a side door. "What the-" Apollo appeared in a flash of light, grinning happily. "Hey, guys. Hey, lil' sis," he said to Artemis. She held up her bow and arrow, and Apollo gulped. "Um, let me explain. Since we took the demigods directly away from their important duties, the time is stopped outside the throne room. There is no real way to get out, unless we call for break." Everyone glared at him, thinking the same thing: _Thanks for telling us now, Apollo._  
**  
I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!'" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshipped.**

"That's lame," Ares said. "I can show you some real action." Percy did something he'd never done before. He kept reading quickly.

**But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C- in my life. No-he didn't expect me to be as good; he expected me to be better. And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.**

I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral. He told me to go outside and eat my lunch.

The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.

Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city. I figured maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York state had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.

Cue curious looks at Poseidon and Zeus.  
**  
Nobody else seemed to notice. Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds wasn't seeing a thing.**

"Sure she isn't one of yours, Lord Hermes?" Annabeth asked. He shook his head. "Don't think I remember a Bobofit, no."  
**  
Grover and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from that school-the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere.**

"Detention?" Grover asked.

"Nah," I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean-I'm not a genius. "

"That's a bit obvious," Annabeth said. "Your head is full of kelp." She got hit by an almost miniscule wave. Of course, being his girlfriend meant you didn't get splashed a lot.  
**  
Grover didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?"**

A huge laugh.  
**  
I didn't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it.**

I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and thought about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to jump in a taxi and head home. She'd hug me and be glad to see me, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.

Most of the demigods who were present had dead/immortal moms, but they could sympathize.  
**  
Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized cafe table.**

"Cool!" Leo yelled. "Dad, do you have one?" He asked Hephaestus. He said, "Yes son. I'll teach you how to make it." Leo beamed.  
**  
I was about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends-I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists-and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap.**

Percy nearly growled.  
**  
"Oops." She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray- painted her face with liquid Cheetos.**

"Mom, can we do something about her?" Jason and Leo looked at Piper in surprise. She blushed. "I know I'm not that much of an Aphrodite kid, but…"  
**  
I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I was so mad my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears.**

I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!"

Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.

Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see-"

"-the water-"

"-like it grabbed her-"

"I wonder who his daddy is," Jason said sarcastically.****

I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.

As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc. , etc. , Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey-"

"I know," I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks. "

Hermes shook his head. "Never guess your punishment."  
**  
That wasn't the right thing to say.**

"Come with me, " Mrs. Dodds said.

"Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. I pushed her. "

I stared at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.

She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.

"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she said.

"But-"

"You-will-stay-here."

Grover looked at me desperately.

"It's okay, man," I told him. "Thanks for trying. "

"Honey," Mrs. Dodds barked at me."Now. "

Nancy Bobofit smirked.

I gave her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare. Then I turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.

How'd she get there so fast?

I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.

I wasn't so sure.

"Hades, this isn't one of…them, is it?!" Poseidon yelled at Hades. He was suspecting it was a Kindly One.  
**  
I went after Mrs. Dodds.**

Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on-

"He probably could have stopped it," Piper said.

-**but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in his novel. **

**I looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.**

Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop.

"Hah, if only," Frank said.  
**  
But apparently that wasn't the plan.**

I followed her deeper into the museum. When I finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.

Except for us, the gallery was empty.

Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.

Percy, Annabeth and Grover shivered, because they had met the Kindly Ones.  
**  
Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it...**

"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.

"She's not the only one," Nico and Thalia said in unison.  
"He also gives the gods problems," Annabeth said. "If you call them _problems._"  
**  
I did the safe thing. I said, "Yes, ma'am."**

She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"

The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.

She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me.

I said, "I'll-I'll try harder, ma'am."

Thunder shook the building.

"We are not fools, Percy Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain. "

I didn't know what she was talking about.

"Nobody did when the monster found us," Leo said.  
**  
All I could think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room.**

Hermes grinned.

**Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on Tom Sawyer from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to take away my grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book.**

"That truly is the worst punishment."  
**  
"Well?" she demanded.**

"Ma'am, I don't... "

"Your time is up," she hissed.

Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched, turning into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.

Poseidon looked murderous. Percy stopped and said, "Just wait, Dad. I'm still here, lemme finish the chapter."  
**  
Then things got even stranger.**

Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.

"What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed the pen through the air.

"Awesome," Jason breathed. "I have a coin that turns into a sword/gladius, but it can't appear in my pocket when I drop it."  
**  
Mrs. Dodds lunged at me.**

With a yelp, I dodged and felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword-Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always used on tournament day.

Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes.

My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.

She snarled, "Die, honey!"

And she flew straight at me.

Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.

The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water. Hisss!

Mrs. Dodds was a sand castle in a power fan. She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me.

"How did the kid know how to swing, and hit directly, and at that, a _Fury?_" Zeus said. Ares grinned. "Maybe he's got battle instincts."  
**  
I was alone.**

There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.

Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was there but me.

My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.  
  
"Magic mushrooms? Seriously?" Hazel asked.****

Had I imagined the whole thing?

I went back outside.

It had started to rain.

Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt. "

"Who?" Thalia asked.  
**  
I said, "Who?"**

"OH NO! I talk like Kelp Head!" A wave hit Thalia. "Hey, why does everyone get huge waves but Annie gets raindrops?"  
Percy replied, "It's not polite to hit your girlfriend with a wave." He smirked, and Athena raised her eyebrow.  
**  
"Our teacher. Duh!"**

I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about.

She just rolled her eyes and turned away.

I asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.

He said, "Who?"

But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at me, so I thought he was messing with me.

Hermes clicked his tongue. "I need to teach you to lie, Grover. I'll get my kids to help."  
**  
"Not funny, man," I told him. "This is serious. "**

Thunder boomed overhead.

I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he'd never moved.

I went over to him.

He looked up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson. "

I handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.

"Sir," I said, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"

He stared at me blankly. "Who?"

"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."

He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling alright?"

"That's the end of the chapter," Percy said.  
"DUN DUN DUN…." Leo did a dramatic drum roll on the floor.  
"So, after the Exploding Demon chapter, who's reading next?"  
"I will," Grover said. He took the book from Percy.

**So, what about this one? It's Spring break, so I'll upload about one a day. I'll add another character, any suggestions?**


End file.
